Glorifying double mastectomies - museum exhibition

I bet they do not explore stories from a remotely gender critical point of view - of how “gender” has created so many very serious problems for women, children and LGB people. And for free speech for that matter.
Because it's the public arts sector AND it's Bristol.

Do you say this from experience or opinion?
My loved one has never regretted their decision.

The exhibition is rated 14+.

Do you seriously believe a 14 year old shouldn't know what a mastectomy is!?

Those things are illegal so of course they don't belong in an art gallery. No one is committing a crime here.

Stop being obtuse.

It’s the spare one we keep in our handbags in case we see a man who’s penis has got lost. It’s part of the #bekind rules. I often go up to men and ask them if they need a penis as I have a spare 😂😂

Imagine if you were born a woman, but also happened to have an additional penis that of course completely interfered with your ability to properly identify as the sex you identified with?

What's an additional penis?

but I also am not in the "trans people are all mentally ill or evil and a threat to our children
Literally no poster has said that they are a threat to children.
The ideology, which the museum is promoting, and some posters are happy with, is a threat to children and young people.
It's not only weird (which I agree is subjective) it's dangerous.

Um.. no woman has or has ever had a penis, never mind an additional one. If you’ve got a penis, you’re not a woman. Are you pushing the “born in the wrong body” trope?

Would you be saying the same thing if instead of an exhibition about 'gender stories' it was one about self harm, or anorexia, with a mural like this outside the space, where children of all ages can view it?

I mean, what?!?!

On another note, reading the stories of detransitioners who have had the surgery and now deeply regret it - is pretty devastating in fairness.

Imagine if you were born a woman, but also happened to have an additional penis that of course completely interfered with your ability to properly identify as the sex you identified with?

Christ on a bike.

They most certainly can in the US, one who had her breasts removed at age 14 is suing her surgeons as she was too young to consent. Another was only 15, also suing the surgeons. This is a very regular occurrence according to health insurance company data. It's around 15/16 in Canada, too.

So what about photos of paedophilia? Is that 'subjective' too? What about art depicting severe animal cruelty? Where do you draw the line? Do you even have a line? 'Subjective' to me sounds like an excuse to go well beyond the bounds for society and a get out clause, an excuse. It won't wash with me.

There should not be any need for a child to know what a mastectomy is. That's the problem, we've stopped sheltering our children and allowing them to have a childhood. They're learning adult concepts way too soon.

Your post is very contradictory: Surely if the surgery is very painful and invasive then a person would need to have a very very good reason for having that surgery? They wouldn't just do it for fun or on a whim? So: using your own argument: it must be incredibly important for a person to make the decision to put themselves through that surgery - because it would have to be mega important for anyone to want to suffer through that kind of surgery.

The people who get mastectomy surgery are not in any way making any kind of comment about those who need them for cancer treatment reasons. So to conflate the two is awful. Plus, you are ignoring that fact that many women who have had mastectomy surgery for cancer treatment/prevention reasons DO celebrate their surgery: indeed there are art exhibitions dedicated to women who have undergone mastectomy surgery, and chosen to make an art feature out of their scars by having tattooed art added to make them look beautiful. Are you saying that women who have had mastectomies for cancer related reasons shouldn't be permitted to be proud of their journey? Or add body art to their bodies/scars? Or to be featured in art exhibitions???

Since you agree that it would have to be something really important to make a woman go through the agony of a mastectomy then why on earth can't you make the linkage between that and adults dealing with a body that does not reflect their gender??

Surely you must have also seen that there are men who require surgery because they have breasts that are overly big and have grown far too much breast material: they have breast reduction surgery so they feel more masculine, because otherwise they feel that both they and other people don't understand that they are not women/are not feminine as represented by their breasts. That surgery is tremendously important to them.

And, of course, your viewpoint would also prevent women from having things like breast reduction surgeries - which for some are utterly vital to their being able to walk/being able to avoid hideous spinal damage.

Again: if you don't want to go to the exhibition or don't want to have a mastectomy then don't have one. But to presume that you should be able to dictate what other people should do with bodies is offensive and wrong. Stay in your lane.

Wow. Did you actually take the time to go to the Museum's website and read about this exhibition? Why, by the way, has artwork from many well regarded artists (like David Hockney for example).

The point of the museum is not to "glorify mastectomies"!!!!! That's just rage bait nonsense on your part. As the museum explains:

We don’t have all the answers, but we’re excited to explore these complex questions together. Whether you’re beginning, continuing, or seeking to understand a gender journey – your own or someone else’s – this exhibition offers a meaningful space for reflection and discovery.

They are providing a learning opportunity for people who wish to understand more about gender, and also why some people are born with bodies that do not reflect their gender and how that feels to have to deal with that very difficult situation.

Perhaps if you feel that people are seeking to "glorify" having breast material removed you would benefit from actually attending the exhibition and taking the time to see things from a variety of different points of view.

In the meantime: policing art of any kind is a slippery slope. Freedom of artistic expression is hugely important and vital to a vibrant and free society where we all benefit from knowing we can express ourselves in our artworks without fear.

If you don't like the exhibit then don't go. If you don't want a double mastectomy then don't get one. But trying to impose your views on gender on other people is as bad as them imposing theirs on you: would you like it if people interfered with your surgical decisions? Of course not. Do you really think people are super happy and stoked to need to go to hospital and have hideously painful and hugely invasive surgery just to feel like their body is correct? Imagine if you were born a woman, but also happened to have an additional penis that of course completely interfered with your ability to properly identify as the sex you identified with? Wouldn't you want to be able to have that appendage removed/altered without being called horrific names and being demonised for doing so? What would it mean if you were prohibited from having that surgery?? The point of this exhibition is to allow people to have those conversations in a safe place. And to learn about people who have had to confront those kinds of massive decisions themselves and to understand why they made the decisions they made. These people exist: they are real, and their experiences are as valid as yours are.

I agree with you OP.

My mother had a mastectomy due to breast cancer, which she later died from. It’s so bizarre to me that mastectomies are happening in contexts outside of cancer treatment.

The problem isn’t necessarily showing breasts or acknowledging that some women with breast cancer (or potentially at a higher risk of developing breast cancer) have their breasts removed, but presenting a mastectomy as some kind of normal thing that healthy people should undergo is shocking. It’s a horrible, painful surgery and certainly wasn’t something my mother wanted to do.

It’s a major surgery and I just don’t like the message sent to women who feel uncomfortable with their breasts, or by extension with their gender, that a solution should be to remove healthy breast tissue.

If we’re going to have a public display about mastectomies could they not include at least a few stories from breast cancer survivors, embracing their bodies after treatment, or at least some acknowledgement that a display of mastectomies is going to impact those who have had breast cancer, or those who love something who’s had breast cancer.

Appalling that a museum should endorse this and show such action as positive. Those who have suffered due to cancer know what a painful experience this is, trying to present this operation as a choice is horrific

Anyway, I'm off - said my piece and you can draw whatever conclusions you want from it.

Perhaps you're right. I exited all of those threads a few years ago when yes, that is exactly what they were. There was a while when it was every other thread in AIBU, usually with vague or unrelated titles and a descent into name calling within a few pages.

And I note "evil" made it's appearance pretty early on in this thread.

And yes I'm sure there's nuance on both sides, however MN posts about it (of which there have been so, so many) are not usually bastions of this. I've found it's usually both sides yelling about how evil and awful the other is.

You can’t have read many of these posts, because they really aren’t “both sides yelling about how evil and awful the other one is”.

Perhaps your reading of “both sides” requires some more nuance.

Oh and the opinions I added - they're just that. A hodgepodge of experiences and beliefs, likely some contradictory and certainly subject to change or challenge. I added them not to argue their merit as some bastion of righteousness or look how moral I am, but to say - yep, I'm probably an unknown poster, but I'm a human, this is a bit about me and yes I've experienced being yelled at by GC people and by pro-Trans people but no I won't be intimidated into taking a black and white position on what is an incredibly personal and politicized issue. And really this response to the exhibition seems to be more about a particular viewpoint than about the display.

I will also admit I clicked on this expecting it to be about mastectomies rather than a trans thread - I tend to avoid those if I can.

I'm sure there probably are, I'm not an expert in this area. I only added my stuff because there appeared to be an insinuation of trolling directed at anyone who didn't immediately jump to shocked horror at the OPs link, that they were unknown posters so therefore suspicious. I didn't think that was the case, and a disingenuous suggestion designed to discredit alternate points of view.

I don't have a particular agenda other than maybe finding it weird that the display as I have seen it, and questions around gender in an age restricted exhibition, could elicit such a horrified reaction. It's not hard to explain to kids whichever way you like, and open conversations are always better than silence or fear. It's very much up to the parent in question as to what kids would take away from this.

And yes I'm sure there's nuance on both sides, however MN posts about it (of which there have been so, so many) are not usually bastions of this. I've found it's usually both sides yelling about how evil and awful the other is.

I refuse to remove nuance from the discussion

It’s quite the category error to suggest that anyone not sitting on the fence has “removed nuance from the discussion”. Sitting in the middle is not a guarantee of nuance (or, indeed, righteousness), nor is it an moral good in itself (and there are plenty of things in your posts that others might wish to “nuance”).